Marcia Sá Cavalcante Schuback

Professor, Philosophy, Södertörn University

Biography

B. 1957. Professor in Philosophy at Södertörn University. PhD from Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (1992), with the thesis O começo de deus, on Schelling’s concept of beginning. Has published numerous articles and three monographs in philosophical hermeneutics, latest Lovtal till intet – essäer om filosofisk hermeneutik (2008). Directed the Research project “Det egna och det främmande, om Bildningstankens aktualitet”, supported by VR (2003-2006). During the last three years Cavalcante-Schuback has been leading the research project "Loss of grounds as common ground" supported by the Baltic-Sea Foundation, in which she discusses the exilic meaning of existence as existence exposed to the with-out. See “Translation and Exile” in Translatability (Stockholm: Albert Bonniers Förlag, 2011), 180-190. “The fragility of the one” in Politics of the One, Artemy Magum (ed.), (London: Continuum, 2012) ”Still/Encore” in Existential Utopia. New Perspectives on Utopian Thought, ed. Patricia Vieira and Michael Marder (London: Continuum, 2012), p. 51-53 and Being with the Without, a conversation with Jean-Luc Nancy (Stockholm, Axl Books, 2013).

Ongoing research

Imaginative hermeneutics

The main subject of my research project in the realm of the Research program Time, Memory and Representation is the role of imagination in hermeneutical thought. My participation in the program has two levels. I have contributed to the formulation of the program and I am part of the administrative staff of the Program. As a researcher, I began my work first in the second year of the Program.

My inquiry about the role of imagination in hermeneutical thought as the articulation of time, history and memory, arose from my former research. I used the term “imaginative hermeneutics” for the first time in my readings of medieval philosophy, published 1998 in Portuguese under the title Para ler os medievais. Ensaio de hermeneutica imaginativa (Petropolis: Vozes, 1998).

Since then, I have worked on two central questions trying to develop: a) the in-between as hermeneutical category, which is the main topic of my book Lovtal till intet. Essäer om filosofisk hermeneutic (Glänta, 2006) and b) the phenomenology of imagination and of the image, which is the main topic of my book Att tänka i skisser. Essäer om bildens filosofi & filosofins bilder (2011).

From these former inquiries what became clear for me was how the in-between rather than a place in-between places or forms is the movement of a coming to forms. In this sense, the in-between is neither temporal nor spatial but rather a spatial-temporal category that exposes the movement of becoming from within, that is, while becoming. As such it can be described as a dis-forming movement, a movement of abandon of former and formed forms without reaching another form and hence remaining in tension with the no-longer and the not-yet. It can be described as a form in exile, for at stake in the experience of exile is a departure without return and without arrival, even when returning and arriving. I proposed to call this tension a sketch and to understand sketch as form in exile. Central for these discussions is the being with the without at stake in the sketch-like, exilic experience of an in-between.

In the last two years, I have been studying the sketch-like, exilic, inner dynamics of the in-between, and proposing an interpretation of what hermeneutical interpretation means, above all in relation to Heidegger’s concepts of “destruction” and “deconstruction”, the later under Derrida’s influence.

Full project description available here (.pdf).

Imaginative hermeneutics

The main subject of my research project in the realm of the Research program Time, Memory and Representation is the role of imagination in hermeneutical thought. My participation in the program has two levels. I have contributed to the formulation of the program and I am part of the administrative staff of the Program. As a researcher, I began my work first in the second year of the Program.

My inquiry about the role of imagination in hermeneutical thought as the articulation of time, history and memory, arose from my former research. I used the term “imaginative hermeneutics” for the first time in my readings of medieval philosophy, published 1998 in Portuguese under the title Para ler os medievais. Ensaio de hermeneutica imaginativa (Petropolis: Vozes, 1998).

Since then, I have worked on two central questions trying to develop: a) the in-between as hermeneutical category, which is the main topic of my book Lovtal till intet. Essäer om filosofisk hermeneutic (Glänta, 2006) and b) the phenomenology of imagination and of the image, which is the main topic of my book Att tänka i skisser. Essäer om bildens filosofi & filosofins bilder (2011).

From these former inquiries what became clear for me was how the in-between rather than a place in-between places or forms is the movement of a coming to forms. In this sense, the in-between is neither temporal nor spatial but rather a spatial-temporal category that exposes the movement of becoming from within, that is, while becoming. As such it can be described as a dis-forming movement, a movement of abandon of former and formed forms without reaching another form and hence remaining in tension with the no-longer and the not-yet. It can be described as a form in exile, for at stake in the experience of exile is a departure without return and without arrival, even when returning and arriving. I proposed to call this tension a sketch and to understand sketch as form in exile. Central for these discussions is the being with the without at stake in the sketch-like, exilic experience of an in-between.

In the last two years, I have been studying the sketch-like, exilic, inner dynamics of the in-between, and proposing an interpretation of what hermeneutical interpretation means, above all in relation to Heidegger’s concepts of “destruction” and “deconstruction”, the later under Derrida’s influence.

–“The Eye and the Spirit of Nature: Some Reflections on Merleau-Ponty’s Reading of Schelling concerning the Relationship between Art and Nature” in The Barbarian Principle. Merleau-Ponty, Schelling, and the Question of Nature, ed. Jason M. Wirth and Patrick Burke (NY: Suny Press, 2013)